Getty New York Knicks forwards Wilson Chandler and Danilo Gallinari look on during a 2008 game against the Miami Heat.
It’s bad times once again in New York Knicks land, where the team has lost seven of its last eight games and 13 out of 16. Given the sharp and sudden downturn, fans, hoop pundits and even people within the organization have been pointing fingers in an effort to identify a culprit amid the freefall.
Some would point to Julius Randle’s regression as the problem. Others believe Leon Rose sealed the Knicks’ fate during the offseason. World Wide Wes apparently thinks Tom Thibodeau is to blame. Meanwhile, James Dolan continues to be namechecked as one of the worst owners in professional sports.
Where Dolan is concerned, the hate is running as strong as ever. Last month, ESPN’s Max Kellerman — a Greenwich Village product — went on national TV and declared he wouldn’t be a Knicks fan again until Dolan sold the team.
Kellerman is hardly alone in that anti-Dolan camp, though. Just ask former Knick Wilson Chandler.
Chandler Sounds off on Fans Ripping Dolan
Chandler — a 12-year NBA veteran who spent parts of four seasons with the Knicks after getting drafted by the club in 2007 — described a typical fan interaction in a Friday tweet. Apparently, hoop-heads ragging on Dolan is an everyday occurrence for the 34-year-old.
“‘Oh, you’re Wilson Chandler right? Playing in NYC was the best right? I mean everything except Dolan huh?’ Never fails lol,” he wrote.
El oh el indeed.
Of course, no new ground has been broken here — fans have big-time issues with Dolan. The Knicks have been objectively bad for large swaths of his tenure at the top. All the while, New York’s executive chairman has been embroiled in controversy.
Dolan famously tangled with Knicks legend Charles Oakley and superfan Spike Lee. He also wrote hate mail to one fan while banning another from Madison Square Garden for suggesting that he sell the team. Then there was the time he directed MSG employees to record all of Carmelo Anthony’s on-court conversations.
That’s saying nothing of his bad basketball hires — hello, Phil Jackson and Isiah Thomas! — or the Anucha Browne Sanders debacle.
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Chandler’s Run in NYC
After making low-key waves during a two-year run at DePaul, Chandler was selected by the Knicks with the 23rd overall pick in the ’07 draft. He went on to appear in 35 games as a rookie, including 16 starts, and averaged 7.3 points, 3.6 rebounds and 0.9 assists per contest.
The following season, he blew up under new head coach Mike D’Antoni, starting 70 of the Knicks’ 82 games and logging a 14-5-2 line. His output would steadily improve over the next year and a half, culminating with a 2010-11 campaign that saw him average 16.4 points per game for New York while hitting 35.1% of his triples.
However, his run with the franchise came to an end in February of 2011 when he was sent to the Denver Nuggets as part of the Carmelo trade.
Chandler’s last taste of action in the Association came during the pandemic-shortened 2019-20 campaign with the Nets.
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